Cheap Thrills on your DS
Dec 12Okay, maybe “thrills” is too strong a word…
Right now Target has the Nintendo DS game Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords available in its clearance bins at the endcaps right in front of the checkout registers. It’s $15.
The best way I can describe this one is Bejeweled meets Final Fantasy. It’s a puzzle RPG. No, I’m not kidding.
The fellas over at Penny Arcade were pretty excited about it, which is what got me turned onto it, and I enjoyed the hell out of it. For a few weeks there, all I seemed to do was quest my puzzling ass off every night after work.
So if you have a DS, or if you know someone with a DS who needs a good gift but who isn’t worth cracking the $20 threshold on gift value, there you go.
Let's help a UK Trekkie.
Dec 11Someone out there is missing a couple of decorative Star Trek wall plates, thanks to heartless burglars. Anyone recognize the property?
(Although if they’re Voyager plates or some shit, I’d probably shatter them before I’d give them back.)
STAR Trek memorabilia are among items recovered by police from a property in Malvern during an investigation.
Although they were found in Malvern, a police spokesman said the items could have been the proceeds of burglaries anywhare in the area.
“We have no indication at all as to where they originate from, but we very much hope that there is someone out there who will recognise some, if not all, of the items, whether belonging to themselves or someone they know,” said the spokesman.
advertisementThe items are set of four small tea-cups and saucers, a brown leather wallet, a small fob watch, a key-ring bearing the name Neil, a 1962 penny on a chain and the two Star Trek commemorative wall-plates.
Anyone who believes they recognise any of the items is asked to call police on 08457 444888, and ask for DC Gareth Llewellyn on extension 60813. Information can also be given – anonymously – to Crimestoppers on 0800 555111.
Blah blah blah comics blah (12/10/07)
Dec 10Why am I doing this again?
Superman Annual #13, The Brave and the Bold #8, and Johnny Hiro #2 all somehow fit together, if I stretch my brain and clap my hands and wish I was a REAL BOY. They are all examples of something that seems incredibly easy being done incredibly well, and that “something” is “smart, fun, enjoyable superhero comics.”
Of the three, Superman Annual #13 is the weakest. It suffers from a deflating lack of momentum brought about by delays, fill-ins, and the general abuse of Kurt Busiek’s gifts to create material that has padded out Superman’s sister title, Action Comics, while Geoff Johns and Real-Time Hollywood Big-Shot Richard Donner attempt to complete their first storyline with the help of one of the Kuberts, I forget which, but he’s late a lot. Were this conclusion to Busiek’s Camelot Falls storyline part of the regular Superman title, and had it run in those pages as part of an ongoing storyline with reasonable gaps between creation and release, I honestly think it would have been a better-written tale. I know it would have read better. As it stands, this is just a big fight between Superman and some slimy monsters, with a bit of self-doubting subtext sprinkled on top. The backup story, though slight, is more of a keeper, a set of pure character moments that define the members of this new “Superman family” for readers.
Johnny Hiro #2 is the least-superheroish, and the hardest for me to review, because I don’t know what to say except that it’s, oh my goodness, so very very great. Our title character works as a busboy in a restaurant, and his chef needs a lobster to serve to a prominent food reviewer, so Johnny steals one from another restaurant, which gets him chased by an unruly pack of rival busboys/ninjas, and he has a sweet girlfriend who loves him a lot. There is an energy here, a willingness to simply BE what it IS without trying too hard to be something it’s NOT, that is infectious in the extreme. It’s an action comic, it’s a relationship comic, it has unexpected fourth-wall shattering interruptions from what I assume is the writer/artist regarding different types of sea life, and it all fits together. It is happy to exist as it is, and doesn’t apologize for itself at all.
The Brave and the Bold #8 is as traditional and basic as it gets when it comes to modern superhero comics. Mark Waid and George Perez deliver the goods, and again, it looks so easy that it must be incredibly hard, when you get right down to it. The Flash “family,” the Doom Patrol, Metamorpho, and the Challengers of the Unknown all have their moments here, and they are who they are; there is conflict and superheroics, and then everything’s somewhat resolved, with a haunting hint of dissatisfaction at the end that adds an unexpected layer of depth to what was otherwise a simple romp.
Now I babble.
Resident E*V*I*L
Dec 10I’ve been sick over the weekend – a long ignored cold went nuclear in my skull and took a stab at the lungs as well. I’m fine now thank you. I mention it only to set the stage for my weekend, which involved a lot of sitting in front of the television, letting the magic Xbox entertain me.
At one point I was idly watching old episodes of M*A*S*H, when something caught my eye. Not an anachronism (the show has few.) Not a stray nurse nipple (the show is infested.) I am, after all, a nerd.
I saw the Umbrella Corporation logo.
Don’t believe me?
It’s like the wet dream of a fan fiction writer, and then they wake up to find they’re currently having sex.
Blah blah blah comics blah (12/7/07)
Dec 07In which I attempt, yet again, to review single issues of comic books.
Batman #671 is part 4 of “The Resurrection of Ra’s Al Ghul,” and at this point, it feels like this crossover is just too messy to hang together over individual issues. The individual books have a rough sense of their own identity, but the pieces just sorta meander together, and I find it hard to follow the story from installment to installment. Another problem may be that at this point in the tale, there’s pretty much no jeopardy; I guess Batman is helping Ra’s to save Robin and Damian, but wouldn’t it be faster to just beat the shit out of Ra’s henchmen and get on with his life? Or are Robin and Damian even still in jeopardy at this point? Furthermore, why is there a fountain of life in Nanda Parbat, but the Question went there and died of lung cancer? Will that be explained ever, and if not, how fucking stupid is that? I like Batman and Morrison enough to give this one a re-read once all the pieces are in my hands, but even as a weekly storyline, it lacks cohesiveness, and that makes it feel slight.
The Brave and the Bold #7 makes me wish DC would replace their current pasty balding Executive Editor with another pasty balding man. Mark Waid is one of a handful of people in the WORLD who understand modern superhero comics enough to walk the fine line between protecting major corporate properties and delivering exciting stories that both honor and challenge those properties. Sure, it feels a little “retro,” and it’s clear the industry and the audience has moved beyond this kind of storytelling…but imagine him in a role where he could oversee writers like Grant Morrison, Greg Rucka, and even Geoff Johns. In other words, he’s the ideal man to stand at the boundaries while other minds push against it. Shit, imagine a Waid-edited Countdown, freed from the awkward contortions of editorial fiat and senseless death and violence. Anyway, this is a great comic book; the characters ring true, the action is dynamic, it’s got Superman and Wonder Woman and Power Girl, and it’s fucking DONE IN ONE. Righteous.
Green Lantern Corps #18 is the penultimate chapter of the Sinestro Corps War, and yet it feels too…small? We get a decent fight between Sodam Yat and Superman-Prime, with the occasional bit of cringe-worthy dialogue for Prime (I get that he’s petulant, but petulance gets annoying real fast); flashbacks explore the background of Sodam Yat’s past. In the sense that it focuses on a single Green Lantern (now Ion) and delves into his personal mindset, it fits well with what this title should be doing; as the next-to-last part of a very major storyline spanning whole universes, I wish it wasn’t so intimate. The story calls for a real Agincourt moment, a “troops before dawn” kinda thing, or even just lotsa sweeping battles that shoot you straight into the last chapter and the BIG big battle. On the pure positive side, Peter J. Tomasi acquits himself well in his first issue as regular writer on this title, which means I’m looking forward to continuing to read it, and not at all missing Dave Gibbons (yet).
Marvel Atlas #1 is just way less fun than I hoped it would be. Not much more I can say. In general, these handbook-type items are something I always seem to want more than I enjoy, although the original Marvel handbooks and Who’s Who from DC have a nostalgic value. They do, however, ALWAYS make great toliet reading material.
